Rack mount gaming computer connectivity

Jamesr98 · January 22

Hi there,

I recently purchased a house and have been planning my networking out.

I'm going to get an electrician to run cat 6a Ethernet cable from my server to the key spots in my home.

Whilst they are doing that, I had a thought about doing rack mount gaming computers as well, kind of like what Linus has done with his home. But this would be far in the future plans.

I was thinking I could get fibre ran to some areas along with the Ethernet whilst they already had my walls open.

My question is, what else do I need to get this to work?

Some key requirements:

2x 2560x1440 displays. 1 of which must be high refresh rate. Would be nice to support higher resolutions as well.
Usb 3.1 connectivity. For detachable storage, keyboards, mice, headphones, controllers, etc.

With these in mind, my goals are:

Have the physical computer in another room, keeping me away from the noise and heat. (40+ degree summers are not nice)
Keeping everything centralised in my rack

I'm hoping to hear about your experiences with this kind of solution and issues you've encountered.

Thanks for the assistance.

Blue4130 · January 22

50 minutes ago, Jamesr98 said:

My question is, what else do I need to get this to work?

At minimum, a $500 thunderbolt 4 cable and system that can use thunderbolt 4. (Assuming you can get away with a 25m cable - price goes up quickly if you want longer) and a couple hundred for a TB dock.

jaslion · January 22

And if you wish to not spend 1k+ on going thunderbolt.

Optical hdmi/dp + usb over ethernet and you're usually done for around 100-150$ and dont need to rely on finding hardware that doesnt fuck up with thunderbolt!

You'll sacrifice speed with usb over ethernet but well if ya need to do large transfers just walk to your server room or better yet just have a teeny tiny management mini desktop/laptop whatever to do that with. Easiest solution by far if doing the cheap route.

Even with a mini desktop setup as an extra it will STILL be cheaper than doing thunderbolt

Blue4130 · January 22

In the short term, if you don't want to commit to anything, run conduit and put pull cables, then you can worry about it later without having to rip walls open.